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The plantation in which this story takes place is in the
Solomon Islands owned by
David Sheldon, who controls his slaves with an iron fist. We enter the story as the islands are suffering from a severe sickness, killing off people one by one. Eventually, Sheldon bows to the fever that his workers are experiencing and he's left weakened and vulnerable. This is when Joan Lackland arrives with her shipwrecked crew.
From this point forward Joan begins changing everything about the plantation. It's enjoyable reading about the changes in Sheldon as the story progresses. He starts off extremely racist and sexist towards anyone who isn't a white male. With Joan around, he has no such room to continue being that way.
The character of Joan, is really where the book redeems itself. For a book of that time, it is rare to find such a strong female character. What follows are adventures through the islands and a glimpse of plantation life in that place and time.
Every time you begin a Jack London book you are immediately swept away by his masterful writing and this is no different. Very romantic and full of excitement and adventure. The story gives good insight into white slavery and racism well, though.
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John Griffith "Jack" London (born John Griffith Chaney, January 12, 1876 - November 22, 1916) was an American novelist, journalist, and social activist. A pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction, he was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone.
Some of his most famous works include
The Call of the Wild and White Fang, both set in the Klondike Gold Rush, as well as the short stories
"To Build a Fire," "An Odyssey of the North," and "Love of Life". He also wrote of the South Pacific in such stories as
"The Pearls of Parlay" and "The Heathen", and of the San Francisco Bay area in
The Sea Wolf. London married Elizabeth "Bessie" Maddern on April 7, 1900, the same day The Son of the Wolf was published. Bess had been part of his circle of friends for a number of years.
London was part of the radical literary group "The Crowd" in San Francisco and a passionate advocate of unionization, socialism, and the rights of workers. He wrote several powerful works dealing with these topics, such as his dystopian novel The Iron Heel, his non-fiction exposé The People of the Abyss, and The War of the Classes.
In later life London indulged his wide-ranging interests by accumulating a personal library of 15,000 volumes. He referred to his books as "the tools of my trade."
In 1905, London purchased a 1,000 acres ranch in Glen Ellen, Sonoma County, California, on the eastern slope of Sonoma Mountain, for $26,450.
He wrote: "Next to my wife, the ranch is the dearest thing in the world to me." He desperately wanted the ranch to become a successful business enterprise. Writing, always a commercial enterprise with London, now became even more a means to an end: "I write for no other purpose than to add to the beauty that now belongs to me. I write a book for no other reason than to add three or four hundred acres to my magnificent estate." After 1910, his literary works were mostly potboilers, written out of the need to provide operating income for the ranch.
